“We did that,” the First Lady interjected. “As expected, the Moldovans said it was carrying troops. We have evidence that they doctored the cargo to make it look like an invasion force.”
“It was, madam,” Sen’kov said. “Look at the plane’s radar installation. You will find it is different than the normal navigation and weather radar — it has been modified for all-weather terrain-avoidance operations. Normally explosives are planted when military equipment such as this is installed in civil aircraft, to destroy these components in a crash, but I know that most aircrews will disable the explosive device on most low-level flights because they fear turbulence will cause the charges to go off.”
The President finished his ice cream, poured himself more iced tea, walked around the Oval Office a bit, then said, “You know, I feel powerless, Valentin. I can’t get any more aid approved for Russia until Velichko backs off or is ousted. What else is there to do? What’s your prediction here? How far is Velichko prepared to go?”
“I know that I may not be considered an impartial reference, Mr. President,” Sen’kov said. “I lost my office to his hard-line socialist party; I have made it quite clear that I intend to run against him in the next election; and I certainly do not share his extreme views. But in my opinion, sir, Vitaly Velichko is a madman. He will not stop until the Ukraine, Moldova, the Baltic states, Kazakhstan, and Georgia are all firmly in the Commonwealth, back under Russian domination. The presence of American warships in the Black Sea, and Ukrainian airmen in Turkey training with NATO forces, is proof to him that Russia is doomed unless he acts, with all the speed and power of the Russian military.”
“But what is he going to do?” the First Lady asked. “How far is he going to take this?”
“Madam, a planeload of SPETSNAZ troopers is only the beginning,” Sen’kov said. “Velichko feels he was betrayed by the Ukrainians, with American and Turkish assistance. The recent news that the Ukraine has been stockpiling weapons in Turkey is simply more proof. Romania or Lithuania is not a great threat to Russia — but the Ukraine is. He will have to deal with the Ukraine.”
The President and the First Lady looked at each other and suddenly felt uneasy.
TEN
Pavlo Grigor’evich Tychina was mad enough to chew nails. If he heard one more wingman grouse about having to pull another night of air patrols, he was going to put a missile up his butt.
For the sixth night in a row, Tychina was leading a gaggle of twelve MiG-23 fighters, NATO code name Flogger, on air patrol of the Volynskoje Uplands of northwestern Ukraine. To Tychina, it was an honor to lead this large formation of planes. It was unusual for such a young aviator to command such a large flight, especially when the patrol was at night — not to mention the very tenuous political and military conditions under which the patrol was now operating. Because the Air Force had been conducting these patrols round-the-clock for over six months now, the thought had crossed his mind that they were running low on fresh, seasoned pilots and were digging deeply into the less-experienced crews to lead night patrols. He, Tychina, was the leader, and had been for nearly a month and twenty sorties now.
“Lead, this is Blue Two.” The radio call came a few moments later. It was Aviation Lieutenant First Class Vladimir Nikolaevich Sosiura again. “My fuel gauge is oscillating again. It’s bouncing on empty. Maybe I better take Green Two back to base. Over.”
“Vlad, dammit, this is the second ‘oscillating fuel gauge’ in three nights,” Tychina said. Sosiura’s roommate and drinking buddy was in Green Two — how obvious could Vlad be? “Maybe you had better talk to your plane captain and get some different malfunctions. In the meantime, hold your position.”
“Go to hell, Pavlo,” Sosiura in Blue Two replied. “If I flame out, it’ll be your fault.” Sosiura’s “butt-comfort duration” was about forty-five minutes, and most of the time it didn’t take longer than thirty minutes before he or someone else in the twelve-ship formation started seeing “malfunctions” crop up in their planes. Tychina thought they gave “soft” new meaning.
The twelve Mikoyan-Gurevich-23 single-engine, single-seat jet fighters were on a night air-combat patrol of the Volynskoje Uplands, nicknamed the “Polish Bunghole” because of its vast stretches of dark wasteland and its close proximity to Poland and Belarus. Air patrols of the Bunghole were necessary because long-range radar coverage in this region was so poor: the L’vov radar adequately covered the Polish border and even into Slovenia, but radar sites in Kiev, the capital of the Ukraine, and Vinnica in central Ukraine were short-range approach radars only, leaving huge gaps in radar coverage in the northwest. They had installed outdated, unreliable Yugoslavian portable radar units in the area, but they rarely worked, and the more reliable Soviet- and Ukrainian-made mobile radar units had limited range. With tensions this high, the Ukraine needed reliable long-range eyes in the sky.
By forming six gigantic racetracks in the skies over the Bunghole, Tychina was able to fill that five-hundred-kilometer-wide gap. The six ovals were aligned north to south. Each was about one hundred kilometers long, and separated by about seventy-five kilometers, spread from west to east from the Ukraine-Poland border to Zitomir, about one hundred fifty kilometers west of Kiev, from where surveillance and ground-controlled intercept radars would pick up the air defense task. Each oval had two fighters in it, orbiting apart from one another so that when one plane was turning southbound, the other was turning northbound. This way a solid wall of radar energy was always being transmitted northward to cover the Belarus-Ukrainian border west of Kiev. Similar radar pickets had been established in the skies between Kiev eastward to Char’kov, covering the Russia-Ukrainian frontier, and more conventional air patrols were in the skies near the Crimean Peninsula and over the Black Sea.
Almost a hundred MiG-23, MiG-27, and Sukhoi-17 fighters were involved in this night operation, rotating in two-hour shifts from air bases at L’vov in western Ukraine, Kiev and Vinnica in central Ukraine, Char’kov and Doneck in eastern Ukraine, and Odessa on the Black Sea. Three more groups of a hundred planes each patrolled the rest of the day — the patrol operation involved two-thirds of the Ukraine’s fleet of combat aircraft. In addition, four-fifths of the Ukraine’s eight hundred military and government helicopters — not just combat or patrol helicopters, but transport, communications, liaison, and command helicopters as well — patrolled the Russian, Belarussian, and Moldovan frontiers day and night. It was easily the largest air armada ever launched by a former Soviet republic.
Tychina was proud to be part of this vital mission and happy to be commanding this large air patrol, but a little worried as to exactly why they were up here. He knew that relations were strained to the point of war between Russia and two of its Commonwealth of Independent States’ allies — Moldova and the Ukraine — over a tiny enclave of Russians living in the Dniester region of Moldova (what used to be the Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic). And just last month, Moldova had blasted that Ilyushin-76 Russian transport right out of the sky. Still, that little skirmish was between Moldova and Russia. Or was it?
Tychina finished his northward leg with nothing showing on radar. “Task Force Imperial lead turning,” he reported. The rest of the formation was supposed to time their turns with him, but it was easy to get out of sync. One by one the pilots reported their turns to their orbit-mates. The formation was staggered a bit, no more than a minute or two off — the Belarussian border was still being covered. Tychina turned his radar to STANDBY on the southbound leg, started a stopwatch to time his next turn, did a cockpit check, made a few fuel calculations — about twenty minutes left before they headed for home — and settled in his narrow, uncomfortable ejection seat to wait. The next shift of fighters should be calling airborne from L’vov in about ten minutes, and in thirty minutes he’d be back on the ground. They’d be down long enough for a refueling, a bathroom break, a quick snack, and another plastic bottle of apple juice before launching for the second shift.